Some Acknowledgement
by Gingeh
Summary: He should have been begging for the chance to date her, but here she was, practically offering herself on a silver platter, and half the time he still made those stupid goo-goo eyes at Betty. For such a genius, his brain was seriously messed up.  J/C


**Some Acknowledgement**  
_(Gingeh owns neither Jimmy Neutron nor a rocket ship, therefore she cannot go to Pigfarts)_

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Cindy angrily ripped a brush through her freshly washed hair, muttering darkly under her breath.

Neutron had done it again.

(When she'd been ranting to her best friend earlier, Libby had asked what exactly 'it' entailed; Cindy had given her the best furious glare she had in her arsenal and loudly proclaimed, **"IT!"**)

For crying out loud, you didn't just kiss a girl when you had a stash of hundreds of pictures of a _different_ girl hidden away in your stupid lab!

She threw the hairbrush to the floor with a loud clatter, and left the bathroom in a huff, flopping face-down on her bed moments later.

Either he liked her or he didn't!

Dear God, she'd lost count of the number of times he'd made some sort of move on her!

…She'd also lost track of the number of times he'd made some sort of move on _Betty Quinlin_.

She flipped over to lie on her back, staring at the ceiling hard enough to bore holes into it.

That Betty. While this wasn't _all_ her fault—most of it was stupid Nerdtron's—she definitely held some of the blame. What did Betty have that _she_ didn't have? Other than niceness, of course. But come on! That goody-two-shoes act of hers got so old after a while; no one was the sweet in reality! It made her want to barf magical pixie dust.

Maybe she should just give up. There were plenty of other guys out there, guys who would worship the ground she walked on (as was proper), instead of arguing with her _constantly_, getting her involved with his idiotic adventures and inventions that _always_ went horribly wrong, and calling her a _stupid girl!_

She fumed silently for another minute before groaning loudly and throwing a pillow across the room.

She was _Cindy Vortex!_ Why should _she_ have to give up? If anything, _Nerdtron_ should give up, because she was _so _out of his league_._ He should have been _begging _for the opportunity to date her, but here she was, practically offering herself on a silver platter before him, and half the time he still made those stupid goo-goo eyes at _Betty_.

For a genius, he obviously had a lot of stuff gone wrong in his head.

After few minutes of frustrated screaming into her pillow (the one she _hadn't_ tossed across the room), she sat up and grabbed the book sitting on her bedside table. Obviously, thinking about Spewtron was getting her nowhere but _extremely_ frustrated; she'd just put him out of her mind for a little while.

She hadn't been reading five minutes before the main character and her love interest were sharing a passionate kiss, and Cindy was suddenly remembering the feel of Jimmy's lips on hers that evening in the alley . . .

Shortly thereafter, the book joined Cindy's first pillow across the room. _Damn _romance novels!

It wasn't like any of this was her fault! _She_ never initiated anything! She may have done a little sabotage between Neutron and Betty now and again, but she'd never directly instigated anything between herself and Jimmy.

…Well, nothing concrete and physical. She may have hinted to him a couple of times, asked him to be her partner for a few things, almost confessed once or twice…

But _she _hadn't started that game of footsie in the library! _She'd_ never pecked him on the check when he came up with a good idea! _She _hadn't been the one to pull them into the oh-so-brief kiss in the alley!

Yes, it was all Neutron's fault.

. . . Betty had kissed him on the cheek. More than once, actually.

Maybe that was it.

Maybe she just needed to be more assertive!

(If anyone had heard Cindy Vortex telling herself that she needed to be _more_ assertive, they would most likely have either started laughing hysterically, or run away in screaming terror.)

That _was_ it! Maybe if she just did something _first_ for once, things would turn around! Sure, it wouldn't be something she would normally do, but hey, she could change! And, _if _she changed, maybe Jimmy would—

She brought her thought process to a screeching halt there by bringing her palm to her forehead with a _smack_. "Hold it _right there,_ Vortex. I'm _Cindy_; Neutron can take it or leave it. I am _not _going to become some dopey-headed fangirl who chases him around and pulls him into random dark corners for heavy make-out sessions!"

(She had to close her eyes for a minute to suppress all the distressingly hot thoughts that flooded her brain after that last idea.)

If Spewtron wanted some simpering little oh-_James_-you're-so-_handsome_-kiss-me-you-_fool_ kind of girl, then he could just go and look somewhere else.

If he wanted her, he could chase her.

If he didn't want her, he could go to Hell.

That settled, Cindy reached for her boom-box remote and turned up the music as loud as it could go. (That _outta drown out any more Nerdtron thoughts!_)

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Unfortunately, despite several hours of blasting the new Grey Star CD Libby had loaned her at eardrum-splitting volume (she'd been forced to plug in her earphones after the first five minutes, because her mother had marched upstairs and told her off for disturbing the peace), Jimmy was still in her head.

...He was also on her windowsill.

She blinked—once, twice, three times—and rubbed her eyes. When he was still there, making frantic shushing noises at her and attempting to clamber the rest of the way through her window, she opened her mouth and practically shrieked, "_Nerdtron!_ What do you think_—mmph!"_

The rest was muffled when Jimmy, finally making it into her bedroom, practically threw himself at her and slammed a hand over her mouth.

A slightly tanned, callused, _warm _hand. It was firm against her mouth, and when she opened her lips to yell at him—because how _dare _he manhandle her like this, it was her house, she could scream if she wanted to, and what was he doing in her room at _one_ in the _morning_—she could _taste_ his _skin_.

She quickly shut her mouth again.

"Listen, Cindy." He looked nervous, probably because as soon as he moved his hand, she was going to bite his head off. "I need a serious favor."

She _wanted_ to say, "It's _always _something," or "No thanks, I'm not in the mood for anything _life-threatening _today," or "Why don't you go ask _Betty_?"

But he still had his hand over her mouth, and she sure wasn't going to try talking again, not after the last experience.

"Look, I—"

So she bit him.

He started to yelp, but somehow managed to stifle it. He quickly brought his hand away from her mouth and whispered heatedly. "Vortex! What in Newton's name was _that_ for?"

"You put your _hand_ over my mouth!" was her somewhat-breathless, but nonetheless very angry reply. "What the hell did you _expect?"_

"Oh, I don't know, maybe I expected you _not to bite me!_"

"Well, you should have! What else was I gonna do, kiss it?"

Silence.

She'd spat it out without thinking. The 'K' word.

She _knew_ they didn't talk about it. Any of it, but especially _that_.

…Well, what_ever!_ Hadn't she had this with conversation with herself earlier? He could either just finally admit that, _yes_, he actually thought she was smart, _yes, _he _had _kissed her, and _yes_, he _liked _her, or he could take a hike.

It would probably be a stupid nature hike with Betty Quinlin, surrounded by butterflies and baby rabbits and unicorns.

But that was okay. Fine. She didn't care. She didn't _want _to be Betty!

Jimmy coughed. "Um. Yeah. Anyway."

Oh, no! He was _not _just going to ignore this _again_! "Look, Nerdtron, you like me! You admitted it on Mars—"

"I did _not_," he immediately cut in. "I said you _distract_ me!"

"And that I'm pretty, smart, and smell nice; it's the _same thing_."

"Is not!"

"Is _so_!"

"Is not!"

She rolled her eyes. "Fine! Then explain the kiss!"

"I don't _know_ why I did it!" He panted heavily in the brief quiet that ensued after that, and glared at Cindy as if this was all _her _fault.

"You know what?" She shoved at his chest and he fell backwards to the floor, catching himself with his hands at the last second. He opened his mouth to yell at her, but she cut him off. "Fine! That's just _fine_, Nerdtron! Then you don't like me, and you had no reason at all for the stupid mushy things you've done to me over the years. Whatever. Just don't _do_ anything anymore, and go date Betty Quinlin, _okay_? _I'll _find someone else to like, someone who will actually _appreciate_ me!"

She paused for a minute, letting him absorb that, before growling, "Now _get out of my house!_"

He didn't move, and she was on the verge of picking him up and throwing him out the window when he said, "I never said I _didn't_ like you."

She blinked. "Um…come again, Neutron?"

"I _said_, that I never said I didn't like you."

If she hadn't already been sitting on her bed, she probably would have ended up on the floor with Jimmy. "Okay. So . . . you don't _not_ like me?"

"Yeah." He shifted uncomfortably.

"So you _do _like me?"

"I never said that either!" He shot back viciously.

"Well, it's gotta be one or the other, Neutron," she retorted crabbily—couldn't the guy just _make up his mind_? "So pick: Right here, right now. Do you like me or not?"

"I don't _know!"_

Could he be _more _frustrating? "What do you _mean_, you don't know! You _have _to know!"

"Well, excuse me, but I don't, Vortex!"

"Well, find out!"

"How am I supposed to find out? I am _not_ experimenting with the love pheromone again, not after what happened last time!"

"Just _kiss_ me, idiot!"

Immediately, she shut her mouth and started inwardly berating herself. First off, not only had she said the 'K' word for the _third _time, which would no doubt send him running from the conversation, she had basically just asked him to plant one on her. Hadn't she been complaining about lowly fangirl-types earlier? Well, how was her saying, "Just kiss me, idiot," any different from the mushy "Kiss me, you fool," she'd been so determined to never become? How had she sunk so low in just a few minutes of arguing with Neutron? …This was obviously all his fault.

She'd tell him that. "Neutron, this is all your fau—_mmph!_"

For the second time that night, she was cut off, and while her first instinct was to inflict some sort of heavy damage on him, her second instant to turn into a gooey pile of mush quickly overwhelmed the first.

Because Jimmy was kissing her. Seriously kissing her this time, not just a brush by the cheek, or even like the brief peck in the alley. _He was actually kissing her_.

Seeing as she was Cindy Vortex and most definitely _not_ a stupid fangirl, she powered through her mushy second instinct and kissed him back. (She was pleased to notice that his legs had gotten too wobbly to support him, and he'd had to sit down on the bed next to her or else he might have fallen over.)

When they broke apart, Cindy immediately attempted to pretend that she wasn't breathing heavily at all—what the hell was he smirking for? She _wasn't! _And besides, _she_ wasn't the one who'd gotten weak-kneed halfway through!

"Well?" She scowled at him, annoyed at that purely-male smile of satisfaction _still _on his face.

He cleared his throat. "More experimentation is required before I can make a full analysis."

. . . Had he just said he wanted to kiss her again?

It wasn't exactly a confession, but she'd run with it. "If you want to do more . . . _experiments_, understand that this is a one-subject thing. No running over to Betty's house for counter-experiments. You have to draw conclusions just from this. Got it?"

Had that stupid smile just gotten bigger? "Understood, Vortex."

"Good." She folded her arms and arched an expectant eyebrow at him.

For once his big brain actually seemed to get the message, and he leaned in to kiss her again.

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"Hey, Neutron? What was the favor you wanted to ask me earlier?"

"Huh? Oh, I was hoping you'd come have dinner with me in my lab tomorrow. Aunt Bertha is coming over, and I can't stand her—she always pinches my cheeks—so I'm going to be holed up my lab all night. Vox can't cook, and Mom won't let me sneak anything out of the kitchen, so I thought maybe you could bring food."

"…That's the most unromantic dinner invitation I've ever heard."

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**Author's Note:**

Wow, first time writing something outside the Anime/Manga section! (Avatar: The Last Airbender is a weird splice between cartoons and anime, and doesn't count.) …It's a lot less different than I thought it would be. Although the lack of honorifics was strange, and I wanted to write sweatdropped once or twice xD.

Anyhoo, this was just something fluffy to keep me going with _Secret Memories_ (which is going to start maybe getting somewhat dark soon; I'm _dreading_ it). Hope you enjoyed it :).

The alley kiss I keep referring to, by the way, is that one from the end of the episode, "The Lady Sings the News". Which was entirely too brief and not nearly dramatic enough, because, for crying out loud, they've been trying to get Jimmy and Cindy to kiss for three seasons! It at least deserved a close up!

…Also, Pigfarts is (c) to Starkid. GO WATCH AVPM. 8D

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